Connectors are commonly used for devices, including aircraft devices, powered by electricity to connect one set of electrical conductors such as wires, cables or pins to another set of electrical conductors. Existing connectors commonly used, for example, on aircraft devices powered by electricity are subject to moisture and/or liquid hazards during service. Such devices can fail if their live electrical conductors encounter conductive moisture and/or liquid in the form of water, fuel, hydraulic, de-icing, or other fluids in service. Electrical failure may occur when the live electrical conductor electrically short-circuits, resulting in a loss of electrical power and/or damage to components due to electrical overheating and arcing.
Existing connectors for the sort of applications described above often use a rigid plug made of an epoxy material (or other curing plastic compound) to encapsulate electrical contacts in order to protect the connectors and the electrical contacts from electrically degrading. In an aircraft application, for example, this epoxy plug commonly surrounds a connector solder cup connection, sealing against a metal back-shell on one end, and directly to PTFE (polytetrafluoroethylene; commercial name:)Teflon® coated wires on the other end. This may not be an optimal sealing arrangement because PTFE's inherent non-stick properties may make it difficult to maintain adhesion of epoxy-like materials to the PTFE.
FIG. 1 is a cut away view of a prior art connector. The existing (prior art) design uses a rigid plug 20 made of epoxy material to encapsulate soldered electrical contacts 22 and is intended to protect the contacts from electrically degrading. In the aircraft application, the epoxy plug 20 may surround the connector solder cup connection, sealing against a metal back-shell 25 at one end 20a of the plug, and directly to PTFE (polytetrafluoroethylene; commercial name: Teflon®) coated wires 26 on the other end 20b of the plug. In an aircraft, the back-shell is a support and provides a sealing surface and boundary for plug 20. It may be difficult to maintain adhesion of the epoxy plug 20 to the PTFE coated wires 26 because of PTFE's inherent non-stick properties. It also may be difficult to maintain adhesion of epoxy to the metal back-shell 25 because of the different respective coefficients of thermal expansion of the plug 20's epoxy and the back-shell 25's metal.